JEFFERSONVILLE —
Tanya Tuell asked how many homes the new proposed downtown Jeffersonville canal district would take.
“I’m interested in property rights,” she said, wondering if homeowners that are in the way are going end up in dwellings comparable to those they were bought out of.
Phyllis Croce questioned where the water for the new canal would come from — especially on dry days when rainwater doesn’t fill the channel.
Karen Carden wondered if the city would end up needing to carry more insurance.
Those questions represent a sampling of several posed by residents who attended an informational meeting on the downtown canal proposal Monday evening.
Mayor Tom Galligan and other officials have championed the $52 million project as a means of correcting combined sanitary and storm sewer overflows and solving flooding problems in the downtown area.
Nary an empty chair could be found inside Jeffersonville City Hall chambers where the meeting took place. Many in attendance were downtown homeowners wondering if their home would be bought out and when.
Galligan, alongside project managers Peggy Duffy and Clinton Deckard, had answers for some, but not all, of the questions being asked.
Responding to Croce’s question, for instance, the mayor explained that the water would come from stormwater during wet weather and other sources — such as sewer treatment plant effluent — during dry weather.
Galligan would not say definitively how many homes would be bought to make way for the canal, saying that the precise route has not been determined. As to the question about insurance, he remarked: “It’ll be four feet deep. If you fall in, just stand up.”
Several homes on Ohio Avenue, Indiana Avenue and Maple and Mulberry streets were among those Galligan said would be purchased. One question that continued to surface was about how much the city would pay for homes. The answer continued to be that appraisals would have to be done.
“This is not: We’re trying to sneak up on you and steal your home,” Galligan said, adding that the city would try and be fair but would not overpay.
Responding to another question, he said, “If you’re in the middle of the canal and you turn the appraisal down, we’ll have to condemn [the property.]”
Duffy told the crowd that the No. 1 question she’s received since the project has been proposed is: Why are sewer bills so high?
The Jeffersonville City Council this year voted to raise bills by about 200 percent. The largest part of the increase was felt recently, when the average monthly bill jumped from about $24 to about $50. Phase two of the increase will start in 2012, when average bills will rise to about $55; in 2013, they’ll go to about $60; in 2014, they’ll go to about $66; and in 2015, they will go to about $73 for the average user.
Duffy explained that increases were the result of negotiations with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which she said asked the city to analyze 35 miles of sewer pipes and “fix it so when it rains we’re not dumping sewage into the Ohio River.”
Other cities such as Louisville, Indianapolis and Atlanta have also seen increases, she said.
“We are marching on the same path as the rest of these communities,” Duffy said.
The point she stressed repeatedly: “The sewer rates increases you have seen so far have nothing to do with the canal.”
The rates were put in place to cover the cost of numerous sewer improvement projects that had to occur in order to comply with a legal agreement signed by the city and the EPA. She said many have questioned whether the rates were put in to cover the costs of the canal.
Deckard said the canal is one of two options for revealing the amount of stormwater flowing into downtown — the other being a large underground pipe. Part of the rational for the canal is the economic development opportunities it would create, Duffy said, noting that restaurants and other commerce could front it.
Tricia Smallwood, with the landscape architectural firm Rundell Ernstberger Associates, said it would not be a concrete ditch. On the contrary, she said, it would have numerous water features and water effects along it.
The sketches she showed had it winding — rather than running straight through downtown — following Michigan Avenue southward to Mulberry Street and to the Ohio River.
Tax increment financing, redevelopment money and sewer and drainage fees and grants have been named as potential funding sources. Duffy argued that because the proposal is unique, it’s gotten positive attention from lawmakers in the position to dole out state and federal dollars, who see it as a creative way to solve a problem.
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